


Normality in the Obscure

by DrewWrites



Series: The Perfectly Flawed [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Author is trans, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Mostly focuses on Steve being trans, Multi, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Transphobia, Trans Male Character, Trans Steve Rogers, mentions of dysphoria
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-29
Updated: 2018-07-29
Packaged: 2019-06-17 23:22:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15472380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrewWrites/pseuds/DrewWrites
Summary: When Steve is 14, he tells his best friend, James Buchanan Barnes, that he’s a boy. At that time, he’s known as “Rebecca Grace Rogers” and he wears frilly dresses to church on Sunday’s.**Takes place in The Perfectly Flawed verse, but can be read as a stand-alone.





	Normality in the Obscure

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so, I think I like Attention Deficit a bit more than this one, but I'm still pretty proud of this.
> 
> Also, please note that Steve binds with bandages in this story and that is NOT SAFE. Please bind safely.

When Steve is 14, he tells his best friend, James Buchanan Barnes, that he’s a boy. At that time, he’s known as “Rebecca Grace Rogers” and he wears frilly dresses to church on Sunday’s. 

When Bucky asks why he chose the name “Steven Grant Rogers”, Steve tells him that he saw the names in a newspaper about famous business men, and the names belonged to the two manliest looking men he could find.

For the most part, nothing changes between him and Bucky. Bucky still teases Steve, still pushes him around and calls him a punk, but the pronouns have changed. Bucky also squeezes Steve’s hand tight when it isn’t just the two of them and he has to wear dresses. Bucky even finds some old clothes of his to give to Steve.

Their parents joke that they’re dating, an assumption that brings a flush to Steve’s cheeks.

* * *

When Steve turns 16, he finally works up the courage to tell his mother that he prefers “Steve” and doesn’t like the dresses he has to wear. He has to have Bucky by his side, because Bucky has always grounded him when life got to be too much.

Sarah Rogers was confused at first, asking what it all meant, but at least she was trying. Steve and Bucky celebrated with ice cream at Coney Island, and Steve was able to almost completely ignore the stairs from people who couldn’t quite figure out if he was a little boy or a teenage girl.

Bucky would always protect him when men got too interested, or when someone glared for far too long. Steve once had to hold Bucky back when a few unkind words were thrown at the both of them.

Ma gets used to saying “Steve” and “My son” a lot faster than Steve had expected. He felt that he was normal when it was just him, his ma, and Bucky, joking around and playing card games.

* * *

Steve wears a suit to Sarah Rogers’ funeral. It’s Bucky’s from 5 years ago.

* * *

Without his ma, Steve feels lost. He spends a lot of time with Bucky, and when he isn’t grieving, he’s falling in love. 

After the pain in his chest dulls, and when he and Bucky get jobs, they get a small apartment together. Steve falls for Bucky even faster while they’re in such close contact.

* * *

Steve Rogers lies about multiple things on his enlistment form. The place where he’s from keeps changing, and so does his family history. 

But no matter the recruitment office, or enlistment fair, he’s always Steven Grant Rogers, born male.

“You’re gonna get caught Stevie.” Bucky warns him consistently. But Steve doesn’t care. He wants to be able to serve his country let every other able bodied man.

* * *

Steve is excited for his and Bucky’s plans to go to the Stark Expo. It’s not the ideal way Steve wants to spend time with Bucky, but they get to see cool futuristic things made by Howard Stark himself. 

And Bucky ships out soon after. Steve will take anything he can get

* * *

Steve _was not_ enjoying himself.

The girls weren’t paying him any attention, which didn’t bother him that much, but they were practically hanging off of Bucky. Bucky was thriving under all the attention, and didn’t notice at first when Steve slipped off to a recruitment tent.

They argue, like they do everytime Steve enlists, but they don’t notice Dr. Erskine listening in on their conversation.

Steve resists the urge to kiss Bucky silly when they part ways. He settles for a hug.

For a few terrifying moments when Steve is sat alone in the curtained off section of the tent, he thinks he’s about to be arrested. Whether it’s for lying on his enlistment form, or what he lied about, he’s terrified all the same.

Dr. Erskine is a kind man that puts Steve’s worries at ease. He knows about all the attempts to enlist and asks where Steve is _really_ from. He also casually mentions that he has a copy of Steve’s birth certificate.

He promises not to tell a soul.

When Steve gets “IA” stamped on his enlistment form in big blocky black letters, he feels hope.

* * *

Peggy Carter is fierce, strong, and beautiful. When she decks a soldier in the face, Steve is pretty sure that he’s in love.

She doesn’t care that Steve has to wrap his chest in bandages, or that his face is a little softer than most men, or that he’s on the shorter side.

Steve begins to think that the universe must like him, or that he has some pretty great luck.

* * *

When Steve is chosen for the super soldier program, one of his first questions to Dr. Erskine is about the effects on his body.

Dr. Erskine gives him a wide smile and tells Steve that he doesn’t have a PHD for no reason.

* * *

Steve is ecstatic when he walks out of the chamber muscular and _masculine._

His excitement is quickly dashed by gunshots ringing out and shouting coming from the top deck.

Dr. Erskine takes Steve’s secret to the grave along with the formula for the super soldier serum.

* * *

Bucky has been fighting on the front lines, gotten himself captured, and likely killed. All the while, Steve has been dressing up in costumes and been paraded around the country and then some.

He didn’t want to be a dancing monkey anymore.

He had to get his Bucky back.

* * *

Howard Stark flys him past the front lines, and he takes one last look at Peggy before diving out of the plane.

Bucky is alive, barely, but he’s alive and Steve is ecstatic. The base he rescues Bucky and his squadron from takes some heavy damage during their escape.

Peggy pretends to be mad when Steve makes it back to camp, followed by over one hundred men. She reminds him that he was late, and holds the same fire in her eyes that Bucky always had after countless brawls in Brooklyn.

Steve begins to think that he has a type.

* * *

Bucky and the Commandos make Steve feel at home in a way that he had never felt before. He thinks that this is what people mean when they say “brotherhood” because they tease each other relentlessly, but they have each other’s backs no matter what.

Steve never tells them outright that he wasn’t born with a square jaw or with breasts or any of that, but he doesn’t make it a secret.

He’s pretty sure they know, but they don’t say anything.

Steve starts to feel normal.

* * *

Hydra base after Hydra base, Steve and the “Howling Commandos” dismantle the Nazi’s science division. 

Steve misses Peggy, but he’s glad he’s with Bucky.

It’s the first time he’s loved two people at once and he doesn’t know what it means.

* * *

Steve’s luck runs out eventually.

There’d be a lot of terrifying close calls between him and Bucky, but none of them were as violent as falling from a train and down a mountain, taking a piece of Steve with him.

That seems to be the point where Steve ran out of luck, because things really go wrong from there.

At least he has Peggy, and Peggy makes the pain a little duller.

* * *

There was no other way out. He had to bring the plane down. He kept his voice steady for Peggy’s sake, but truth be told he was absolutely terrified.

Steve took a breath and pushed the stick forward. 

The ice was rushing towards him. He could feel the wind whip through the hole in the glass.

He kept talking to Peggy about their date.

The ice was almost to the nose of the plane now.

Any second he would-

* * *

Nick Fury searches through Howards Stark’s files on Steven Grant Rogers and finds a few interesting things. Among those is a birth certificate for Rebecca Grace Rogers, and a few notes for adjustments on Project Rebirth based on unexpected biological features.

Nick Fury classifies the files under level 10.

* * *

Steve Rogers woke up in a blank room with a headache. 

He felt sore and tired and so so _cold_. He must be sick again. Bucky will know what to do-

Bucky.

It all came rushing back to him, and Steve opened his eyes. Something is very wrong about this room. The radio is playing something familiar. A baseball game. He was there, with Bucky. _Bucky._

Steve sits up in a strange bed and looks around. He can hear cars out the window.

Someone walks in.

“Where am I?”

“You’re in a recovery room in New York.”

How did he get back to New York? He was, what was he doing? He was after the Red Skull, and he crashed? There was no way he was back.

“Where am I really?”

“Captain Rogers-“

Steve tunes out the rest and fights his way out of the room, only to be met with a bigger room. He tears out of that room too, and into the street. It’s like walking into another planet.

There’s odd looking cars everywhere, bright lights, noise. It’s all too much.

“At ease, Soldier.” Steve whips around to see a man in an eye patch walking up to him.

“Sorry for that stunt back there, we thought we ought to break it to you slowly.” The man says.

“Break what?”

“You’ve been asleep, cap, for almost 70 years.”

Steve’s world comes crashing in on him. Bucky, Peggy, Erskine, the plane.

“You alright?”

“I had a date.”

* * *

Apparently, Howard found the cube when he was looking for Steve’s body. SHIELD tried to use it for their own benefit, and it fell into the hands of a man from another world.

The whole situation is like something out of a science fiction book.

The mysterious power is stolen by a mysterious man and the heroes band together to save the day. 

Steve doesn’t feel like this group is full of heroes.

Romanov seems harmless enough, she follows orders and Steve can see that she come from a military background, or something like it. 

Dr. Banner seems quiet and reserved. Even though Steve saw the videos of the monster he supposedly turned into, he seemed a kind man.

Thor was, interesting. He spoke as if from another time. Apparently, he was the aliens brother. _Adopted_ brother.

Tony, Howard’s son, did not appear to be a good man. Not at first, at least. Tony didn’t want to listen to Steve, it seemed. They tear into each other for awhile, before finding a middle ground somewhere. 

Tony Stark earns Steve’s respect when he flies himself through a wormhole in the sky.

* * *

Avengers Tower slowly, but surely, becomes home for Steve. The Avengers become a family, and Steve takes a liking to Tony.

Tony is hard to talk to at first, always rambling or cutting off mid-sentence, but Steve is patient. He reminds Tony where he was, and stears the conversations when Tony doesn’t have the energy to.

They tell each other secrets that they haven’t told anyone else before. Tony recounts Afghanistan, and everything Howard ever said to him.

Steve tells Tony who he really is on a random Thursday night. He really isn’t sure what lead to the conversation, or why they were having it.

The subject had come up in a TV show that Tony said Steve would love.

“What does he mean by that?” Steve asked.

“Transgender? It’s when someone is assigned a gender at birth that doesn’t fit them and they transition. Sometimes medically.” Tony replied. Steve nods slowly. He said it so casually, like it was normal. Like he was talking about the weather. Maybe, Steve realizes, it _is_ normal.

“Hey Tony?”

“Yeah Cap?”

Steve hesitates and then grabs the remote to pause the show. Tony raises an eyebrow.

“Everything okay?” Tony asks.

“I need to tell you something.” Steve rushes out.

“Yeah. You can tell me anything, you know that.” 

“I was born Rebecca.” Steve focuses his gaze on his hands. He’s not sure why he’s so nervous. Usually he would stare someone down, daring them to challenge him. But this is Tony, and it shouldn’t matter so much, but it _does._

“Alright.” Tony says, almost nonchalantly. 

“Alright? That’s it?” Steve questions, risking a glance at Tony. Tony has a small smile on his face, his eyes are soft.

“I mean, that might be the best kept government secret ever, but it doesn’t make a difference to me. You’re still Capsicle.” 

That’s the night that Steve realizes that he’s in love with Tony Stark.

* * *

For a little while, Tony is Steve’s whole life. Well, when they have time outside of Avengers stuff. 

They sit next to each other during movie nights, and always end up staying later to binge whatever show they’re watching. Steve tells Tony the same twenty war stories, and Tony rambles about his tech.

When Tony goes radio silent for a few days, it’s agony for Steve. 

Steve ends up with an arm full of tired engineer, who recounts his week with Aldrich Killian and a kid named Harley.

* * *

Bucky is alive. He’s _alive_ , but he’s so broken. He’s not Steve’s Bucky.

He’s Hydra’s asset. The Winter Soldier took Bucky from Steve and he wants his best friend back.

They take down Hydra, but Steve can see that Bucky is still broken.

* * *

Steve returns to the Avengers to help wipe out the last of Hydra. He gets to see Tony and introduce his team to Sam, and he thinks he’ll be okay.

Then comes Ultron.

Tony kept information from the team. Steve wants to understand, but he’s just disappointed.

When one of the enhanced gets into his head, he sees Bucky. There one moment, gone the next.

In the end, Ultron is gone, Vision and Wanda are added to their team, and Steve really doesn’t want to let his new family go. He doesn’t want to let Tony go.

But he still has to find Bucky, because he’s family, too.

* * *

The thought of seeing Tony again is what keeps Steve searching for Bucky. He knows that it will take time, but he thinks the two of them would get along. 

Well, really, he _hopes_ they’ll get along. It would be inconvenient if the two loves of his life hated each other.

* * *

When he does finally find Bucky, he goes straight to the compound.

Tony looks tired and worn down. He feels skinnier when Steve pulls him to his chest.

“What do you need me to do?” Are the first words out of Tony’s mouth, because he always gives. He gives so much, but he never expects anything in return. He gives Steve so damn much.

“I don’t know.”

* * *

Bucky recovers faster than Steve expected. It’s still a process, and he’s still struggling to remember things, but he’s getting there.

Sometimes Bucky will disappear from Steve’s side for a couple of hours. At first, it freaks Steve out that he can't find him, but he soon finds out that Bucky likes to sit in Tony’s workshop and listen to him work.

Bucky invites him, one night, and he hears Bucky talk more in a few hours than he usually does in a few days. Steve really loves Tony.

Steve soon realizes that he still loves Bucky.

It’s the second time he’s loved two people at once.

He’s still not sure what to do.

* * *

Steve can tell that Tony and Bucky like each other. Steve thinks that at first they were humoring Steve, but they’ve become fast friends.

The trio becomes near inseparable, and Steve should feel jealous when Bucky shoots Tony a heated look, or when Tony flirts with Bucky, but he doesn’t. Because they do the same thing to him.

Steve is really confused, until he isn’t.

After an incident in the lab that leads to a lot of kissing, the three of them sit down and sort through a lot of feelings.

* * *

Steve feels the most normal that he has in a long time. Which is odd, considering he’s in a relationship with two men, and the media is breathing down his neck for being a transgender man. 

He was originally going to keep it “the best kept government secret ever”, but as he did his research, he realized how far the world had come.

And how much further they had to go.

No matter what the world threw at him, however, he was happy. He was loved and he was comfortable in his own skin.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you thought! As always, kudos if you enjoyed and comments if you have something to say.
> 
> Tumblr: andrew-writes-things  
> Beta: religious-pizza-rolls


End file.
